Hugo and The Monk

HoHoHo.. it's cold enough to snow.. bbbrrr.

And, according to Charles and Mili up at 1,000 feet somewhere in Welsh Wales, it HAS snowed and they've also had ole Jack gleefully scattering his frosty wares about, so norty ole Jack Frost.

Meanwhile, in deepest Knightsbridge, it is raining and cold, what a welcome home for Gill who has just returned from Bankok and Hong Kong! But, she said that it was chilly there too with only 11 degrees and no heat in the hotel room.. brass monkeys!

SHE has turned the boiler on to keep house dry and warm, there are no people living above or behind us at the moment, it is much warmer when they are here as they also have the lower back part of the house and there is a BIG hot radiator against the common wall, this means that their heat keeps our flat warm. FREE heat, WE like that. Infact, WE like it a lot!

WE watched a very scary documentary film last night on Sunspots, Solar storms and what happens when the earth gets hit by these, why we have those space things, whose names has escaped my Parrot brain, these giant 'things' monitor the Sun's activity and give us warnings. And there is a station up on the Artic Circle who are 'listening' to the sound the Sun makes.. fascinating stuff these scientists get up to!

Hugo always said that he didn't think it was so much Solar Warming as Sunspot activity, that was the death of the Age of Dynosaurs etc due to the earth being hit by a massive storm and this was exactly what the scientists were talking about last night.. pooooofff, we have a few hours of warning that one is heading our way but what to do? If there is a massive Solar storm coming our way bringing with it dust and heat, how are we supposed to survive.. we won't, that is the answer.

Happier things, I have given HER a nudge..

SHE has had an email from Anne, she is a cousin, daughter of Robert, usually called Bob. She has found a lot of photos circa 1945, they will be of when Constance and Hugo were first married and living waaaay up in the North of India.

Hugo was young when the Second World War started, he was a student at The Slade Art School.

Many years later in 1972, SHE was in Paris when the telephone rang. It was Constance, in shock, to say that she had been telphoned by a Spanish friend who said that Hugo had had a very severe stroke and was in Hospital on the island of Tenerife. He had been working there on Juan-Pepe's house.

Constance, herself, was unwell and asked her daughter to fly to Tenrife to collect Hugo and to bring him back to England. It was May, flights were full but thank heavens for a compassionate woman at Air France, she routed HER to Tenerife via Madrid and off SHE flew.

To be met at the airport by the friend, he warned HER not to be shocked as Hugo was dreadfully thin.. SHE took a deep breath and went into the room to see HER papa, he was conscious and looking at HER, he was completely paralysed, the only thing that moved were his eyes...

SHE smiled at HER papa and stroked his face and bent to kiss his face, then SHE laughed and said "oh no, MY Papa is not thin, he is a fat brown Farver".. for he was exactly as SHE had known him when SHE was a very young child in Malaya.

In a collection of photos from the same era on HER bedroom wall there was, and still is, a little black and white photograph of Hugo, very slim and as brown as a berry sitting on the beach at Port Dixon.

And he had written on the back 'Fat brown Farver, 1953'...

SHE asked HER papa "Do you remember what you wrote, blink twice if you do"... two blinks were done, SHE turned to Juan-Pepe and said "thank you, Juan-Pepe, everything is ok, he'll recover". And he did.. apart from dragging his right foot when he got tired and he made himself draw, paint and write with his left hand.

HER parents went to live in Andalucia. They lived on the back road from Coin to Mijas. Hugo went to the local Art School in Mijas and learnt how to use clay, this was in order to get more movement back into his hands.

And he found a new love!

He had sketched and painted with oils and water colours but had never ever done any sculpture. He LURVED this new medium and within the first six months of his first touching clay, he held a small exhibition in a Gallery in Mijas... and everything sold!

He and Constance were shocked beyond belief, they knew that a couple of people had expressed interest in a couple of the sculptures but Constance's favourite piece, on which she had forgotten to put a 'SOLD' sticker went for a huge price! And even more shocking news.. The Director / Owner of the Gallery confessed to Hugo that he had sold Hugo's own piece which HAD been very firmly marked 'NOT FOR SALE'!

"Then you had better contact them and tell them that it was not for sale and I want it back" said Hugo.. "I cannot" said the man "for it has already left the country and been given away".

Hugo's temper began to rise, so he asked the man to explain himself... the man explained that it was the Bishop of Malaga who bought the sculpture and who had, the very next day, left for Rome to stay at the Vatican as a personal guest of His Holiness the Pope.

Hugo was speechless... and told the man that he was "either the greatest fraudster on earth or he had just made Hugo's year.. forget about a measly day"!

The man, wisely NOT wanting the reputation of his Gallery destroyed, telephoned the Bishop's office in Malaga and spoke to a secretary and explained his predicament... the answer was swift... the gift had been given to His Holiness, he was enchanted with it and several photographs of it sitting on the desk in his private study had been taken. The Bishop would be returning within three weeks with some photographs.

About four weeks later, an invitation arrived from the Bishop, would HER parents like to come to lunch at the Bishop's Palace.

And sure enough, there were the photographs of HER papa's sculpture, sitting on the desk of His Holiness Pope Paul V1 with his hand touching the base. The sculpture was a full sized bust of a monk, there were the shoulders and the robe and the front of the cowl was low over the, but.... there was the mystery.

For if you looked swiftly, you saw a face, yes, you saw the face but no..... there was no face.

One day Constance collected the post from the box and came into the house calling "Hugo Hugo, a letter" and indeed there was 'A' letter, from His Holiness Pope Paul V1 himself, thanking Hugo "for his love of art and his talent", a beautiful, charmingly written 'Thank you' letter.

HER father wept...


GeeGee Parrot.
March 7th, 2012.